How To Create a Frugal Budget

By Erin Huffstetler. Frugal Living Expert

Erin Huffstetler is a freelance writer specializing in frugal living. She enjoys living the frugal life in Tennessee, where the garage sales and thrift stores are plentiful. Her favorite day of the week? Saturday, of course! It's the ultimate bargain-hunting day. Read more

A well-planned budget can help you to achieve your frugal goals. Learn how to create your own frugal budget.

Make a list of all of your regular monthly expenses, including any money that you spend on fun things like eating out, entertainment and hobbies; and any minimum payments that you have to make towards your debts. You can use a budget form for this purpose if it makes the job easier.

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Total your earnings.

Calculate how much you make per month, including any money that you receive from investments and other forms of residual income.

Subtract expenses from earnings. Test out the effectiveness of your budget by subtracting your monthly expenses from your earnings. This will show you how much you can expect to have left at the end of the month.

Rework your budget.

Build in money for debt reduction.

If you have debts, your budget should already include the minimum payments that you have to make each month. Now you need to find the money to pay down those debts. Look at your numbers again, and determine where you are willing to make sacrifices to get out of debt.

Build in your savings and investments.

Now it’s time to budget money for your financial goals. Do you want an emergency fund. Retirement investments. Vacation savings? Make a list of what you hope to achieve. Then, survey your budget once more to find the money that you need to reach those goals. If you have a lot of debt, you may need to skip this step for a while, and that’s okay – debt reduction should be priority one.

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Put your budget to work.

Once you’ve created a budget that covers all of your monthly expenses and financial goals, it’s time to put your budget to the test. Try to live within your budget, and see how it feels.

Assess your budget. At the end of each month, look over your expenditures to see if they are matching up to your budget. If they aren’t, determine if you need to work harder to stick to your spending plan , or if you need to rework your budget to reflect your actual spending.

Assess and assess again.

Be honest about your spending habits. and you’ll end up with a much more realistic budget.

Don’t forget to budget for fun ; budgeting isn’t about total deprivation.

Don’t be afraid to change your budget; a good budget is always evolving.

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